Submarine Catholic

but fifty years ago well after my baptism my first holy communion & my confirmation i would have likely said – practising catholic

most friday nights back then i’d find myself with Father kneeling before him on the carpeted step of the confessional box my little red face pressed upwards to the grille

& even with that flimsy black fabric shrouding the grille i knew that he knew who i was as much as he knew that i knew who he was

& after he’d dissolved a few easy one’s like i swore (he never asked what particular words i’d used)

& after i’d admittedi’ve been rude to my mother (he never asked what my behaviour had been)

& after i’d mumbledi missed mass last Sunday (he never asked if i’d been to mid-week mass)

but always after i’d told himi’ve had obscene thoughts again he questioned me at length – & lingered over this . . . wanting to know each & every detail

& by george i think i’ve finally worked out why.

– Geoff Goodfellow

Father Tom

Or here’s a small story that isn’t small at all. An old friend of mine who is now a chaplain Didn’t get along with his dad too well when My buddy was a teenager. His dad was hard And my buddy was hard-headed, is one way To explain it. One winter night they get into It big-time, shouting and smashing furniture, Almost but not quite exchanging serious fist. Something keeps them from the final frontier, As my buddy says quietly – God knows what. A couple days later the dad has a heart attack, And dies in the kitchen right by the dog bowl. That was forty years ago, man, says the priest. Forty years of me thinking maybe I killed dad. No matter how many times my mom and sister Said I didn’t I couldn’t stop wondering if I did. Who knows why a guy becomes a priest? Man, Whatever reason you say isn’t a reason enough. One great thing about being a priest, though, is That your ego gets hammered regular. So after A while I quit wondering about me and started Remembering him; there were some cool days, Real good days. Remembering those is praying.

– Brian Doyle

The Dark Box

The queue before the Mass dwindles, the Dark Box opens empty. Ready am I, a-confession-to-make. Fumbling the 'Bless me Father I have sinned' bit, envying the confidence of penitents quick to the point, rolling off instances of pride, gluttony, betrayal, illicit sex. Sex, mostly, you would expect, our Church is preoccupied with that. Lust for moral destruction is the problem faced, pared by some measure of atoning grace. I have mortally sinned many times whisper chimed, never getting the words off pat. The confessional exchange begins apace in a dimly lit, enclosed space, where the priest’s barely perceptible face is seen via grille and sliding screen.

Alone at last, facing my past in a divided cabinet, a sanctuary, where sinners in privacy seek forgiveness, penance, and contrition. How odd that pride and inhibition cause resistance to confronting behaviour, improvement of our inner nature, through intercession with the Creator. There is relief, quietly sharing transgressions, unburdening guilty oppression buoyed by principles to respect, and the discretion you expect.

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Gutsy powerful stuff, Geoff.darby | 25 May 2015

Could there be an elephant in the room of Geoff's suggestive poetic enterprise? Yes, there would be connective tissue between this arena of confessional activity and the perpetration of abuse. Perhaps it's old hat these days but this questioning element had its genesis in the juridical model of the priesthood, that with the cultic model has been highlighted a having some causal sway in the power components of the pathological behaviour that has so hurt and harmed the fabric of church life. As we look to understand and gather insight into these issues that have so fatigued us may we continue to have a mind as to how these dominant theologies got to trump the more wholesome sensitivities of pastoral care and concern. I thank God for those pastoral priests that cared for me in my younger years.Paul Goodland | 27 May 2015

Submarine catholic?
I know of that little boy in the confessional who become an old man. Approaching death, he reflected on his catholic progression through life. He reflected that in the beginning he was a 'practicing' catholic,
As an adult he became a 'lapsed' catholic. He lamented that, finally, as an old man he became a 'collapsed' catholic.Now deceased, I wonder would he describe himself as a 'submarine' catholic.
TonyBTony Bland | 29 May 2015

Geoff Goodfellow's poem reflects a conventional socialisation by means school catechetics in the 1950's, whereby a dispensary model of "Confession" (even the name suggests a truncated theology} and a banking mentality of grace prevailed, at least in Ireland and Australia. Formulae and rules,yes, with an unhealthy dose of fear and, in effect, the image of God as overseer and boss, meting out punishment. Little to nothing of our relationship with Christ, growth in the character of our baptism and our mission.
No surprise, then, that when the 60s arrived with the winds of change (not all desirable) so many Catholics 'caved in' and 'gave the games away',
Thankfully,there are signs today of a recovery of the relational and celebratory foundation of the sacrament of reconciliation and, hopefully,when word of this circulates among the 'lapsed', they might be persuaded that the childhood image of Church they have experienced and rejected as "irrelevant" is, in fact,the living sign and bearer of Christ's presence in the world.John Kelly | 31 May 2015